The greatest writer of the English language and the most successful playwright in human history has had his work adapted to film many times. His work has also been adapted to cinema more than any other writer, with more than 400 films adapting his work. Shakespeare is as much a symbol of theatre as the Greek tragedy and comedy masks, but his work is especially cherished by actors, who have traditionally tested their own abilities performing his work.

Before plagiarism was really understood as such, before the advent of copywright, Shakespeare was a shameless literary thief. In fact, only one of his plays, The Merry Wives of Windsor, is thought to have an original plot... and that plot does not exactly reinvent the principles of comedy for the stage. Shakespeare doesn't thrive as the most original voice. He isn't revered for telling unique stories. Shakespeare is Shakespeare because no one told those stories better. His ghost stories, historical epics, fairy tales, and retellings of myth and murders-most-fowl captured the essence of humanity well beyond the substance of the source material. It's Shakespeare's version of the stories that inspire us now. It's Shakespeare's words and phrases that shaped the English language as we know it. It's Shakespeare's plays that have inspired dozens of filmmakers to make hundreds of films.

Even those works which drop Shakespeare's words are still taking inspiration from them, and it is a testament to the universality of his insight that so many foreign language films have been successfully adapted from his work. Shakespeare may be the most important writer of the English language, but Shakespeare does not belong to the English, language or people. Shakespeare belongs to us all.

If you are human, Shakespeare belongs to you.